Revolution at Lenovo: the Chinese manufacturer unveils its ThinkPad X9 Aura Edition, an ultraportable that radically breaks with the ThinkPad heritage. A strategy that clearly targets MacBook Air territory.
At the start of the year, Lenovo announces the color at CES 2025 with its ThinkPad X9 Aura Edition. The Chinese manufacturer is abandoning the historic codes of its professional range to attack Apple’s MacBook Air. A 180 degree turn.
Gone are the days of the sober and robust ThinkPad. The X9 Aura Edition makes a clean sweep of the past with an aluminum chassis available only in silver – no more iconic matte black.
Even more surprising: the TrackPoint, this little red dot which has been part of the ThinkPad DNA for almost 30 years, disappears in favor of a large haptic touchpad. A change that risks making purists (if there are any) scream, but which demonstrates Lenovo’s desire to attract new customers.
The keyboard itself does not escape this metamorphosis. If the keys retain a vaguely rounded shape reminiscent of ThinkPad heritage, their layout is clearly inspired by MacBooks with compact directional arrows and a power button relocated to the upper right corner. A mimicry that raises questions…
Intel Lunar Lake’s bet
Under the hood, Lenovo makes the interesting choice of Intel Lunar Lake processors (Core 200V). A chip that favors energy efficiency over raw performance – a positioning that recalls, again, Apple’s philosophy with its Apple Silicon chips.
The advantage of the X9 compared to the MacBook Air lies in its active dual-fan cooling system. Where Apple’s ultraportable may see its performance restricted under sustained load due to its passive cooling, the ThinkPad X9 should maintain more stable performance over time.
On the screen side, Lenovo is strong by only offering OLED panels, available in 14 inches or 15.3 inches. The 15-inch version uses a brighter 2.8K 120 Hz screen (500 nits) and a more generous 80 Wh battery.
The ThinkPad X9 starts at €1,549 excluding tax for the 14-inch version and €1,689 excluding tax for the 15-inch model.
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